Posts Tagged ‘Lou Donaldson’

Horace Silver was an influential American jazz pianist who is largely responsible for creating what is now known as hard bop. Born in Norwalk, Connecticut, Silver lived close enough to New York City to experience its jazz scene from an early age. After initially picking up the tenor sax, Silver moved over the piano. His big break came in 1950 when Stan Getz hired his band to back him at a Hartford gig. That led to a tour and Silver’s recording debut on one of Getz’s records. Getz later recorded three of Silver’s compositions. In 1951, Silver formed the Jazz Messengers, one of the most influential jazz collectives of all time. He also played and recorded with the likes of Miles Davis, Lou Donaldson, and Hank Mobley, to name a few. In 1956, he signed with Blue Note Records, his home until 1980. Over the course of his career, Silver released over 40 albums as a band leader and countless others as a sideman. Horace Silver was 85 when he died of natural causes on June 18, 2014.

Melvin Sparks was a brilliant electric guitarist who made a name for himself on countless jazz and soul-jazz recordings as a session player and a band leader. Born into a musical family, Sparks picked up the guitar at just eleven years old. By the time he was in high school, he was playing behind Hank Ballard, and within a few years, he was in a touring band called the Upsetters who backed Little Richard, Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield, and Jackie Wilson. He went on to become a session player for Blue Note and Prestige, playing on records by the likes of Lou Donaldson, Jimmy McGriff, and Hank Crawford. In the 90s, he played with Soulive and Galactic during the acid jazz revival. Melvin Sparks was 64 when he passed away on March 13, 2011. It has been reported that diabetes and high blood pressure was to blame.

Art Blakey was a drummer and band leader whose Jazz Messengers, a band he led for an astonishing thirty years, was the onetime home of such future legends as Horace Silver, Lou Donaldson, Donald Byrd, Lee Morgan and Freddie Hubbard. His funky hard bop would become a major influence on all idioms of jazz to come. The artists he worked with outside of the messengers reads like a who’s who of jazz history. Art Blakey died of natural causes at the age of 71 but not before recording dozens of albums.